Cambridge native Digney Fignus stands up at the Chicken Bone in Framingham

Digney Fignus, the four-piece band that’s headed up by guitarist Digney Fignus, is just as comfortable playing straight-ahead rock, melodic pop, country or Cajun-flavored tunes. They’ll do all of that when they make their first appearance at the Chicken Bone on April 25, where they’ll feature songs from their recent self-released album "Last Planet on the Left."

By Ed Symkus/CORRESPONDENT

Wicked Local

By Ed Symkus/CORRESPONDENT

Posted Apr. 23, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Apr 23, 2013 at 11:23 PM

By Ed Symkus/CORRESPONDENT

Posted Apr. 23, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Apr 23, 2013 at 11:23 PM

FRAMINGHAM

» Social News

Digney Fignus, the four-piece band that’s headed up by guitarist Digney Fignus, is just as comfortable playing straight-ahead rock, melodic pop, country or Cajun-flavored tunes. They’ll do all of that when they make their first appearance at the Chicken Bone on April 25, where they’ll feature songs from their recent self-released album "Last Planet on the Left."

Fignus, a Cambridge native who grew up in Lexington, traveled around a bit, spent a number of years in Brookline and is now calling Lexington home again, has changed musical styles as often as living situations.

"I originally came to music through the blues, and through English rock ’n’ roll, kind of figuring out what those guys were interested in," he said. "I took up the harmonica back then. And that was also around the time I first started playing bass.

"My first instrument was clarinet," he added, then put the kibosh on that subject by chuckling and saying, "But that was awful."

Fignus switched from bass to guitar when the songwriting bug hit.

"I was limited by what you could do on the bass as far as writing songs," he said, "but I had an old classical guitar and I started to learn on that. The way I learned guitar was by writing songs on it, and by listening to [recordings of] the masters, by listening to the greats."

He played in a three-piece band that did Eagles covers, then went off into a solo acoustic career, admittedly influenced by the songs of Joni Mitchell – "I thought she was able to put words to melody like nobody else had done in the past," he said.

But disco was in the air and on the airwaves, and change was around the corner for Fignus, who didn’t like what he was hearing.

"I just got so sick of everything," he said. "The music that was coming out at that point wasn’t great, but then I started to hear stuff like the Clash and I started cheering: "Thank God there’s friggin’ music again!’ So I cut my hair, dyed it blond, and put on the red shades, and that’s when I started looking for a band."

That band was the Spikes, who had a brief but memorable run, usually playing in small lofts.

"We were a punk band, a three-piece nut band. We were crazy," he said proudly. "I was totally broke, and I’d get a disconnection notice from the electric company, then take the note at the bottom of it, you know, where it says ‘We’re sorry,’ and make a song out of it."

Page 2 of 3 -

Soon after, Fignus formed the band that goes by his name, which resulted in a hit and some MTV play when he wrote and they recorded the poppy "The Girl with the Curious Hand." (Note: the "girl" in the video – www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjYeroAN6wA – is played by Gail Huff, former WCVB TV reporter and wife of former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown.)

Recording contracts came and went, and Fignus kept playing, but remained a local star, paying the rent by doing technical production work at concerts. He’s still involved in that area, regularly doing announcing, lights, and sound at the comedy club Catch a Rising Star in Providence, where his career has taken yet another turn.

"I started writing bits for some of the comics, and they actually started using them and getting some laughs," he said. "So that, of course, encouraged me, probably in the worst way possible, and I ended up doing some standup down there from time to time."

Asked how that’s going, he said, "If you bomb as a musician that’s one thing; you can chalk it up to whatever, as long as you played it well. But if you bomb as a comedian, you feel like you just absolutely lost your clothes up there onstage. It’s the worst feeling ever. But it’s a fun challenge."

And music has certainly not taken a back seat. He’s still churning out albums – the two before "Last Planet" were titled "Trouble on the Levee" and "Talk of the Town," and they were linked together by the exploits of a most interesting Fignus character named Johnnie Boudreaux.

While the Boudreaux albums told a story, "Last Planet on the Left" is simply a collection of songs.

"Most of them are pretty new, and it’s hard to know where inspiration comes from," said Fignus of the tunes. "Sometimes it’s just the turn of a phrase. But I play the guitar all the time, so sometimes you walk into a cool chord progression. And on this album, I just wanted to concentrate on the songs and on the production, and not really have to worry about putting together another story."

At the Chicken Bone gig, Fignus will sing, and play guitar and harmonica, and will be accompanied by longtime musical partner Chris Leadbetter on mandolin, slide guitar, and lap steel guitar, Wolf Ginandes on bass, and Russell Lane on drums.

"We’ll be playing most of the stuff from the last three CDs," he said. "And once in a while we throw in some fun cover tunes, too. Right now I like ‘Fisherman’s Blues,’ an old Waterboys song, and we always play ‘The Girl with the Curious Hand.’ "

Page 3 of 3 -

OK, two last questions: Will you play anything by the Spikes?

"Umm, the band doesn’t know any Spikes tunes (laughs). I don’t think ‘Disconnection Notice’ or ‘Bite My Chest’ will go with the current repertoire."